Soviet-era probe plunges into Indian Ocean after 53 years in orbit

A Soviet-era abstraction probe launched successful 1972 has re-entered Earth's ambiance and crashed into the Indian Ocean, Russian authorities confirmed connected Saturday.

The Russian abstraction bureau Roscosmos said the spacecraft, known arsenic Kosmos 482, entered the ambiance astatine 0624 GMT earlier hitting the waters westbound of Jakarta, Indonesia.

No accusation was provided connected imaginable harm oregon debris.

The European Space Agency besides concluded that re-entry had apt occurred.

Between 1961 and 1983, the Soviet Union sent respective probes to Venus arsenic portion of the Verena programme to research the planet.

While respective succeeded successful landing connected the planet’s aboveground and transmitting information backmost to Earth, Kosmos 482 went astray soon aft lift-off.

Kosmos 482 was launched connected March 31, 1972, and was scheduled to marque a controlled landing connected Venus.

However, owed to a nonaccomplishment of the motorboat vehicle, the capsule failed to flight the Earth's gravity and has been orbiting the satellite for 53 years.

“The instrumentality was launched to research Venus, but remained successful a precocious elliptical orbit astir Earth owed to a malfunction successful the precocious signifier and gradually approached the planet,” Roscosmos said.

The probe’s descent was monitored by an automated strategy designed to observe hazards successful near-Earth space, according to the agency.

Weighing astir 500 kilograms and measuring astir 1 metre successful diameter, the probe's clang had been wide anticipated by abstraction agencies, though its last landing tract had remained uncertain.

Before Saturday's uncontrolled instrumentality to Earth, experts had warned the spacecraft could past re-entry intact owed to its robust construction, primitively built to withstand the harsh descent done Venus’s atmosphere.

However, Roscosmos stated that "Kosmos 482 nary longer exists."